With the advent of WOK 5 and the changable INI file that GM Al has created, it now becomes possible for anybody at all to create a WOK 5 map. It is simple to do, and this guide was created in order to assist any aspiring mapmakers out there.
Consider this fair warning: creating a map can be a time consuming process. I would estimate it will take between 4-8 hours of work to create a functional map with INI file. So make sure to pace yourself, and if you do so your map will be better for it in the long run.
Note that if you instead wish to make a WOK 4 map, it will be simpler but still require a good amount of time. To create a WOK 4 map simply follow the instructions below skipping all instructions that refer to bridges, cities, terrain, or the INI file. You will need to have a WOK 4 version of the INI file though, for directions on how to create that see step 7b.
If any questions arise, please feel free to contact me and I will be more than happy to provide any further assistance.
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Step 2: Click on "Image", and from the pull down bar "Attributes". The Units box should be checked on "Pixels", and your map should be 727 width by 735 height. That is the standard map size for WOK 5, and works well with web pages and browsers.
Step 3: All right, you now have a blank screen of the proper size. Your next step is to draw your land-water border lines. Do not draw province dividing lines yet, simply decide what the overall shape of the land masses on your map will be. You can then fill in all water areas with the water color (top row sixth from the left in default color scheme). Your map should then look something like this:
That is a 25% sized version of the first steps in creating the second WOK 5 map. Note that nothing is set in stone at this point, indeed, you will almost certainly have to change some land features and overall borders before reaching the final version.
Step 4: Next step is to draw in the province borders. Draw them however you like, but you should have at least 3 neighbors but less than 8 for each province with the best maps. Also there must be exactly 70 provinces. Don't worry about numbering them yet, just draw your outlines, and you'll get a better picture of where you are going:
As you can see I have changed several important features, including removing the isles in the river delta (too small to be made provinces), changing the number of islands in the large central lake from four to three, and fixing up a few other borders. You can add the water attack routes and bridges now if you would like, although I waited until the next step to do that.
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General Tip:You are going to be adding cities and terrain shortly. In order to do this, as well as to fix up fine points of your borders, the magnifying glass tool is very helpful to zoom in on an area and place these items. You should avoid having cities and terrain markers touch province or map borders (or each other!), this will make the map provinces easily fillable by GMs.
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Step 5: Now you need to number your provinces, and add the ten cities. Below are links to the ten city graphics. You'll have to reduce them to make them fit into the map, obviously. Keep in mind that whatever provinces you choose here for your cities are again flexible, nothing is set in stone till the final version. Try to keep at least two empty provinces between any city provinces, that is a good way to make sure they are evenly spaced about the map. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Now, try to number your provinces so that a province is always connected to the one that is numerically both one above and one below it. That is not always possible but you should be able to do it most of the time, and it helps, believe me. This is the point when you are going to add bridges and attack routes over water as well if you did not do so in step 4. No province may have more than 1 bridge!, but there is no limit on water attack routes from any one province. Make sure the dotted lines you use are solid and easily visible. Your map should now be well on its way:
This being a 50% scale model of the next-to-last map I saved in the mapmaking process. You should also box each of your province numbers in at this point so they are always black on white and easily readable no matter who controls the province.
Step 6: It's time to add your terrain! You can find a file with the terrain types used in WOK 5 maps here. Again these are enlarged so you can easily see them, but it's easy enough to reduce them to the proper size. Note that in the mountain and forest terrain types there are a couple of holes in their borders, this is to allow them to be colored in when a province belongs to a certain player. Simply copy the same terrain marker over and over again to fill a province- if any terrain marker is in a province that province belongs to that terrain, otherwise if it is completely bare of terrain makers it is a plain. I suggest if you are going to have a province belong to a certain terrain you cover at least 50% of it to make it clear, but that is personal discretion.
Be careful with the terrain types. How you divide them is up to you, but I find a good ratio is about 45-50% plains, 10-15% forest, 10-15% mountain, and the remaining 20-35% divided up amongs swamp/desert/tundra. Try to get at least one or two cities in each terrain type, to keep things varied up a bit. Of course these are just suggestions- if you want to make a map with a huge desert in the middle or one that resembles a tropical rain forest that is up to you, just be careful to ensure that the players won't be unable to feed their populace or your map will flop.
Also, if you have not done it already, draw a thin black line around the edges of your map, so it is all enclosed instead of open ended. Make your last few tweaks on city location and border drawings at this point (note the city that was in 12 up and migrated to 11- I did this mainly so there would be at least 1 desert city, as well as to get better spacing), and the final version will be playable.
Once you have everything exactly as you want, you need to test your map and make sure all the provinces are fully fillable. To do that, just use the fill tool in Paint (i.e. the paint can) and try to fill in each of your provinces with a color. If there are areas within a province that do not fill in when you attempt this, they are likely not fully connected with the rest of the province and are blocked either by city, border, or terrain marker. Make sure to fix this up so all provinces are fillable with a single click.
Once that is done, you are finished! Here is what my map 2 looked like when I finished:
And that is the final version. But wait, you are not done! That's only the graphical part of the map, don't forget your INI file!
Step 7: Al created a wonderful little advisory on how to fill out your map's INI files here. You will have to name all of your provinces (have fun with this one) as well as assign them starting populations (keeping in mind city provinces should be reasonably well populated), but outside of that it is simply a matter of translating your graphical map into a textual mode.
A couple of pointers: bridges count both for neighboring provinces AND bridge data. Water attack routes are just like land ones, they create neigboring provinces with no bridge data. You don't have to mess with the spell requirements, but the option is there if you want to make some spells particularly easy or difficult to cast.
Double check your INI file once it is completed, and then check it a third time. You want to make sure the data is accurate or it'll cause problems when GMs try to run games with it.
Step 7b: The WOK 4 version of the INI file is easier to make, requiring less data. Straight from GM Al's mouth, you will need the following:
1. The Provinces names, separated by a "," : Provincename#1, Provincename#2, ....
2. The initial (BEFORE Turn#00) POP values, separated by a "," : 100, 57, 210, ....
3. The neighbors for each Province. Thats the most sensitive and important part. A maximum of 10 neighbors per Province is allowed. I need them in the format nb(Prov#,Neighb#) = Neighbor Example : nb(12,1)=13 : nb(12,2)=14 etc. means "Prov#12 has 2 neighbors : #13 and #14". I need that data for EVERY Province and you should double-triple-quadruple check it for errors !
Step 8: Enjoy! Submit your map and INI file to GM Al and GM Nick and we will review it and make sure it is in full working order. Presuming that it is, we will make sure to open a WOK game with the map you designed! Thank you, and WOK on!!!
